Lisbonne: douze points

12 reasons from European Commission Vice President Margot Wallström on why Ireland should pass the Treaty of Lisbon

1. First, the Lisbon Treaty will make the EU more democratic. How? In the first place,by giving more power to the people. For the first time, EU citizens will have the official right to petition the Commission to launch new initiatives. This puts real power in the hands of any citizen who can organise the support of just one million people in a significant number of EU countries.

2. The Lisbon Treaty also gives more power to members of national parliaments – including the TDs and Senators here. They will have greater powers to challenge any Commission proposal they consider goes against the principle of subsidiarity.

3. The Treaty also gives more power to Parliamentarians. The directly elected European Parliament will increase its law-making powers, because "co-decision" will be extended into new policy areas. So European elections will become even more important in deciding the future direction of policy-making.

4. The Lisbon Treaty will extend the rights of EU citizens by making the EU a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights, and by giving legal force to the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. These include the right to life, to education, to freedom of thought, to equality before the law… and workers' rights such as the right of collective bargaining and collective action.

So I don't see how anyone can claim that the Lisbon Treaty undermines the rights of workers! This is not at all the case, as I see it.

5. The Lisbon Treaty will make it easier for the EU to make policy in areas that the public wants us to intervene: eg in areas like climate change and energy security. For the first time, these will explicitly become matters of EU responsibility. EU countries will be able to get their collective act together in cutting greenhouse gas emissions – and in talking with one voice to Russia and our other suppliers of gas and oil.

6. Thanks to the Lisbon Treaty, the EU will be able to deliver results more effectively – not only on energy and climate change but in other key policy areas too – because it can take decisions more easily. This is because majority voting will become the general rule, rather than unanimity.

A Union of 27 countries can literally be paralysed by the unanimity requirement, because there will almost always be one member state opposed to one or another aspect of any given proposal.

7. However, unanimity will still be required in fields such as taxation– which I know are very sensitive matters for Ireland.In important areas of national sovereignty, the national veto will be kept.

8. The extension of majority voting into new areas will make Europe more secure – by enabling the EU to deal more efficiently with terrorism, cross-border crime, illegal immigration and human trafficking. But EU action on these matters will be taken under the democratic control of the European Parliament, which will take the decisions jointly with the Council of Ministers.

9. The Lisbon Treaty will make EU decision-making more transparent. The Council of Ministers will have to hold its meetings in public when enacting new EU policies or legislation.

I don't know whether these meetings will make exciting television – but at least any interested citizen will be able to watch his or her own Government Minister taking European decisions.

It will no longer be possible to portray "Brussels" as an alien monster grabbing power from national governments!

On the contrary, people will more clearly see and judge how different Ministers balance their national interests with the interests of the whole of Europe.

10. Also for the sake of efficiency, a President of the Council will be elected for up to five years. This will give the EU a more stable system of leadershipthan the current six-monthly rotation.

11. The Lisbon Treaty will help the EU to act with greater unity on the world stage. The High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy will also be the European Commissioner for External Relations.This will make it easier to ensure that our aid, trade, development and otherforeign policies all pull in the same direction.

12. Finally, the Lisbon Treaty ensures that defence remains a matter of national sovereignty, so that each Government is free to decide what forces, if any, it will commit to any particular operation. The Treaty willtherefore not compromise Ireland's neutrality (nor Sweden's).

Clearly, we live in a dangerous world, and EU governments see the need for a collective response to some security issues. For example, sending EU peacekeeping forces to some of the world's trouble spots.

Chad and Darfur are cases in point, and Ireland has – I believe – taken a very active and honourable role in this EU action.

But Ireland's Constitution states that it cannot join a common European defence arrangement unless it is approved by a separate referendum of the Irish people. So the bogeyman of a "militaristic EU" sweeping young Irish men and women off to war is a complete myth. Nothing in the Lisbon Treaty is going to touch the triple lock on the deployment of Irish peacekeepers.

Ladies and gentlemen, there you have my "douze points" on the Lisbon Treaty. The Reform Treaty

Full remarks here

Treaty of Lisbon Part 2: Making the EU more democratic

The Treaty of Lisbon makes changes to the structure of the European Union to try and negate the democratic deficit that exists in its structures. The treaty does this in a number of ways.

• Increased Role for the European Parliament


• An explicit role for National Parliaments


• The introduction of citizens' initiative


• Transparency in the Council of Ministers


• Defines EU Competences

Lets look at each of these points in turn.

Increased Role for the European Parliament

Parliament's powers have been gradually extended with every new treaty. The Treaty of Lisbon is no exception, giving more powers in relation to lawmaking, budget and international agreements.

The 'co-decision procedure' (renamed 'ordinary legislative procedure') has been extended to several new fields. This puts the Parlaiment on equal footing with the Council of Ministers. These new fields, where previously the parliament had little or no powers, include legal immigration, penal judicial cooperation (Eurojust, crime prevention, alignment of prison standards, offences and penalties), police cooperation (Europol) and some aspects of trade policy and agriculture.

The new treaty confirms the established practice of working with a multiannual financial framework, which Parliament will have to approve in future. It also abolishes the current distinction between 'compulsory' expenditure (like direct income support to farmers) and 'non-compulsory' expenditure, with the result that Parliament and the Council will determine all expenditure together. This innovation creates a new balance between the two institutions when approving the EU's budget.

Under the Treaty of Lisbon, the European Parliament's assent will be required for all international agreements in fields governed by the ordinary legislative procedure.

An explicit role for National Parliaments

For the first time National Parliaments are recognised and given a role in the operation of the EU, apart from transcribing EU legislation into national laws. A new clause clearly sets out the rights and duties of the national parliaments within the EU. It deals with their right to information, the way they monitor subsidiarity, mechanisms for evaluating policy in the field of freedom, security and justice, procedures for reforming the treaties, and so on.

The parliaments gain a new power to enforce the principle of subsidiarity within the EU. Subsidiarity means that – except in the areas where it has exclusive powers – the EU acts only where action will be more effective at EU-level than at national level. Any national parliament may flag a proposal for EU action which it believes does not respect this principle. This triggers a two-stage procedure:

• if one third of national parliaments consider that the proposal is not in line with subsidiarity, the Commission will have to re-examine it and decide whether to maintain, adjust or withdraw it


• if a majority of national parliaments agrees with the objection but the Commission decides to maintain its proposal anyway, the Commission will have to explain its reasons, and it will be up to the European Parliament and the Council to decide whether or not to continue the legislative procedure.

So this yellow card procedure can highlight where parlaiments believe the EU is over legislating. (we have the dutch to thank for this one. It was one of their "red lines"

The introduction of citizens' initiative

There are already many ways in which European citizens can find out about and take part in the political process of the EU. The newest of these is the citizens' initiative, whereby one million citizens, from any number of member countries, will be able to ask the Commission to present a proposal in any of the EU's areas of responsibility. The practical details of this initiative will be worked out once the Treaty of Lisbon takes effect.

I think will be a mainly only thing. I cannot imagine people posting something to a million people across the EU. It will be something like the the UK Prime Miniter's E-Petition which is written in opensource code.

Transparency in the Council of Ministers

National parliaments and citizens will now be able to see which decisions have been taken by which national ministers in the Council, since all its deliberations on legislative matters will be made public.

Yes finally! We get to find out what happens behind the closed doors in Brussels apart from all the handshaking which they always show on TV!


Defines EU Competences

The Lisbon Treaty sets out exactly what areas the EU can act in! In the Reform Treaty the policy areas of the EU are classified into one of the following three areas:

• Exclusive competence: In this area the EU has exclusive competence to make directives. It also has exclusive competence for the conclusion of an international agreement when its conclusion is provided for in a legislative act of the Union.


• Shared competence: The competence to legislate in this area is shared between the member states and the EU.


• Supporting competence: Here the EU is allowed to carry out actions to support, coordinate or supplement the actions of the Member States.

They are set out below.

Exclusive competence

• customs union


• the establishing of the competition rules necessary for the functioning of the internal market


• monetary policy for the Member States whose currency is the euro


• the conservation of marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy


• common commercial policy

Shared competence

• internal market


• social policy, for the aspects defined in this Treaty


• economic, social and territorial cohesion


• agriculture and fisheries, excluding the conservation of marine biological resources


• environment


• consumer protection


• transport


• trans-European networks


• energy


• area of freedom, security and justice


• common safety concerns in public health matters, for the aspects defined in this Treaty

Supporting competence

• protection and improvement of human health


• industry


• culture


• tourism


• education, youth, sport and vocational training


• civil protection


• administrative cooperation

Wow, long lists I know.

If you want to read the full text of the treaty, a hard copy will cost you €42 from the EU Bookshop. Alternatively you can download the PDF (English or Irish). The HTML version is availibe on EUR-LEX (English)

Treaty of Lisbon Reasons for a Yes Vote. Part 1

Here is Part one of my series of posts calling for a Yes vote to the treaty of Lisbon. This is an over view. Each subsequent part will deal with a specific issue.

The treaty [of Lisbon] will improve the way the EU works, it will adapt the EU's institutions to a union of 27, it will ensure the voice of Europe's nations is heard more loudly in foreign policy. It brings national parliaments into day-to-day decision making to strengthen subsidiarity, and it focuses the EU on the big external challenges from climate change to migration.

- David Miliband, UK Foreign Secretary, Speaking in the House of Commons Deabte on the Treaty

The case made by [William Hague] that the treaty is unnecessary and somehow threatens the sovereignty of the United Kingdom is frankly absurd. An EU of 27 member states and growing can't operate on the same basis that only just served the needs of an EU of 15 states. Arguments for trimming the bureaucracy and making the institutions less cumbersome ought to be self-evident.

Edward Davey, Liberal Democrats Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Speaking in the same debate

The above quotes highlight one of the major reasons that the Treaty of Lisbon is essential to the continued operation of the European Union. It will limit the size of the commission and the Parliement insuring that they will continue to operate satisfactorily.

Some of the key issues in the Treaty of Lisbon are:

• A Charter of Fundamental Rights
  The Fundamental Rights Charter, proclaimed by the EU in 2000, would be made legally binding.


• A merged foreign representative post
  The External Relations Commissioner post merged into the current seat held by Javier Solana.


• Extended role for the parliaments
  The directly elected European Parliament gains power by extending the codecision procedure to many areas. National parliaments will also have extended roles.


• Restructured EU policy areas
  Double majority voting in the European Council expanded to more areas from 2014 on.


• A President of the European Council
  Would replace the currently rotating Presidency of the European Council. 2.5 year term.


• A single legal personality
  Enables the EU to sign international treaties.

These will leed to a more democratic and transparent Europe, a more efficient Europe, a Europe of rights and values, freedom, solidarity and security and give Europe a clear voice in relations with its partners worldwide.

To paraphrase David Miliband I believe this treaty is good for Ireland and good for Europe.

I will try and do one post a day if time allows